2004 GTI tire pressures

The recommended tire pressure sticker in the door jamb says the 17" wheels should have 33 psi in the fronts and 42 psi in the rears. Is this right? I thought the heavier end got higher pressure.

Reply to
Eric Rupert
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It's right... I have all my numbers in the metric version of psi, as my Golf is German built, and doesn't seem to have the imperial sticker anywhere I can find... So I converted. For 15" wheels its 28-30psi front, and 32-38psi rear.

On my parents Volvo its 29-31 front, and 30-36 rear.

Reply to
Rob Guenther

Well, I think some moron was let loose with a boatload of sticky labels....

We picked up our 2004 Golf yesterday, and when I checked the owner's manual for tire inflation, it merely referred me to the stickers on the body. Both doorjamb and gas cover stickers read 33 psi front, 42 psi rear, 42 psi spare (this should make for interesting driving if a front tire goes flat).

Now I need to find someone to explain the following to me:

  1. How is it that cold pressures of 26 psi were specified for both front, rear, and spare tires on our 2002 Golf with identical body, chassis, and suspension?

  1. How can you specify a cold tire pressure of 42 psi for a tire (Goodyear Eagle 195/65 R15 91H) which has a maximum allowable pressure of 44 psi according to the sidewall markings?

  2. Why would you warn the driver that the ESP funtion of the 2004 Golf requires identical tires on all wheels, and then require him to put substantially more pressure on one axle?

  1. Why, after doing all this, would you then deliver the vehicle to the purchaser with 33 psi in all five tires?

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

Jim B.

Reply to
jimbehning

Sounds like some lawyers got involved somewhere. Let me explain.

Some years back, I used to autocross a Honda CRX on street tires. One of the things I was taught was to mark the tires with white shoe polish at the outside corners. Basically, you make a stripe from about

1 inch in on the tread surface, wrap around the edge of the tire, and end about 1 inch up the treadwall. Make a run, look at your marks, then adjust the tire pressure as needed. You where looking for a clean break right at the edge of the tread, which resulted in optimal grip. Running at street pressures typically scuffed the mark right on up the sidewall. Even with high performance 175/60-15 (running stock class) tires, I was running around 48PSI in the fronts and 40PSI in the rears. Every car there with a front weight bias, just like any modern water pumper VW, ran higher, NOT lower pressures in the front.

Lower pressures in the front cause the car to understeer when going into a corner too hot. In other words, the car tends to just plow on straight while you attempt to turn. Typically, this is considered safer than oversteering, for the inexperienced driver. Hence my lawyer comment. A properly setup front wheel drive car will tend to understeer if you keep your foot in the gas, although, it can be made to oversteer if you tap the brake, or if you have a manual transmission, quickly dump the throttle after turning in. You can adjust the balance/oversteer/understeer characteristics of your car by adjusting tire pressure.

Regardless of the what it says on the door jamb, your personal tire pressure settings may be different from what is suggested. If you find the corners/edges of the tread wearing quicker than the center, your tire pressure is too low. Likewise, if you are wearing the center quicker than the edges, your tire pressure is too high. Personal driving habits, how much load you carry, and how it is distributed, play a huge factor.

All that said, always keep your tires inflated above the minimum recommended pressure and below the max. Under inflation and excessive load are the WORST things you can do for your tires, and its not too good for fuel economy either.

The whole Ford/Firestone mess could have likely been avoided if owners had followed the numbers on the tire sidewall rather than what Ford posted on the door jamb. Fords numbers made for a softer ride, with lower handling limits, but allowed too much heat to build up in the tires.

BTW, I have a 1994 Passat now, and keep 38PSI in the fronts and 33PSI in the rears. It isn't much of an autocross monster, but I'm not afraid to let the tail get a little loose on occasion. ;-)

David Glos

Reply to
DLGlos

When you are on the side of the road installing the spare tire, you can let air out of the spare to match the other tire on the axle it is installed on. Adding more air to match would be more difficult in this situation (a tire pressure gauge with a little nub to let air out is much more convenient to carry all the time than a pump).

26psi was probably the light load recommendation at the time, while the full load recommendation is probably significantly higher. They may have dropped the light load recommendation because it leaves too little margin of safety in the case where owners forget to check the pressure and allow the tires to get (dangerously) underinflated (remember the Ford Explorer tire problems?).
42 < 44. When replacing tires, make sure that the load rating and pressure rating are at least as high as those needed by the car. (I.e. don't get 35psi maximum tires, or tires with a load rating of less than 91, for your car.)

Dealer error.

Reply to
Timothy J. Lee

Understood. But how many drivers do you know who carry a tire pressure gauge, or would even think to use it if one were available?

I'm with you there. But where do you find a tire pressure gauge with a dump valve? Up here even the VW dealers don't sell such a gauge, they simply put a "VW" logo on a cheap plastic digital gauge that's $15 at Canadian Tire, and sell it for $35. I've had lots of experience with such gauges, and matching tire pressures by dumping air is quite a trick even with lots of practice. Forget about expecting a novice to do it. Both tires will end up underinflated, and they still won't be matched.

As for a reliable gauge with a dump valve - in several years of looking, I've found an analogue one at Princess Auto for about $12. It was never very accurate, and it died after a few uses. To get something you can trust, you'll have to pay CAD$74 for something like a Hastings Digital (wholesale - $100+ retail).

I just checked the figures on a 2002 Jetta, and its stickers specify

26 psi on all tires except when at maximum load, then the front tires go to 30 psi while the rears go to 41 psi.

If loss of control due to heat build-up and subsequent explosion of an underinflated tire were the reason for raising normal operating pressures by 62%(!!), then one would expect this strategy to be applied to the front wheels, not just the rear.

Maybe if you live in California. But up here in the Rockies, I can easily fill my tires to 42 psi cold in the evening, and end up with a tire that's 45 psi cold before I turn over the engine the next afternoon.

This requires a great leap of faith.

In my experience, VW print documentation is just as apt to be dead wrong as the procedures executed by VW technicians. The problem with VW's stick-on "documentation" in this instance, is that there's no way of verifying it by other sources. The Owner's Manual gives no information, nor does the Bentley Service Manual (which, in any case, hasn't been updated to include 2004 data yet).

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse
  1. 26 is too low... Your sticker must be in error... My car says 26-30 front (I thought it was 28-30, but I was in error... checked today... and I found the sticker with PSI ratings, not just the SI units), and 30-38 in back.... I've tried 38 in back and it seems WAY too hard.

  1. 42 seems too high, but for a spare it's good to have extra air in it, just in case... let a little out when you put it on

  2. Identical tires are needed for optimal traction, different pressures are needed for weight balance I would assume

Reply to
Rob Guenther

Dump valve? (I understand what it is, just using it as an opening)

Reply to
Rob Guenther

I keep one in the car.

The inexpensive pen-shaped tire pressure gauges have a small pin opposite the part you put on the valve; the small pin can be used to depress the pin in the valve to let some air out if necessary. Even if your gauge does not have such a pin, you can use other objects, like keys or pens, to depress the pin in the valve to let some air out.

Probably because the weight on the front is relatively constant, while the weight on the rear could be affected by loading the car to its weight limit with passengers and cargo.

Reply to
Timothy J. Lee

...

Duh!

I'm talking about a release mechanism that allows you to monitor the pressure as you lower it.

So underinflation can't cause a tire breakdown on the front axle?

Did all the Explorer blowouts occur on the rear tires?

Were all the Explorers affected loaded to their maximum capacity at the time?

You propose a lame argument in support of a truly stupid safety strategy.

Anyone who fails to notice a dangerously underinflated tire (the supposed rationale for routinely overinflating them) isn't going to check the pressure of the spare before installing it either, and therefore will have a 50% chance of matching a tire inflated to 42 psi with one inflated to 33 psi when handling a flat.

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

You cannot engineer everything for the stupid. Atl least not on an economy car. The Hummer and other rediculously priced cars have on board inflation monitoring systems. Your problem goes away if you stop being so cheap and spend another $80,000 in addition to the pocket change you spend buying a VW.

The person that pumps a spare up to 42 lbs is not the same person that is going to put it on the car that pumped up. I would hazard a guess that very few people pump up their spare tire. They might be lucky to have 20 psi because the spare tire has not been checked since the day the car was assembled.

An educated pers>>

Jim B.

Reply to
jimbehning

Rob is right, for my 2000 Golf, the inflation sticker on the gas filler lid says minimum tire pressure of 26 psi for light load, somewhat higher for full load.

I guess I tend towards the light load category usually. The original Goodyear LS tires that came with the car wore out prematurely due to overinflation (I kept them at about 33 psi all around, cold pressure of course). It wasn't much of a loss, the tires were terrible, but 16k miles is pretty bad to have to replace 4 tires. Maybe the Golf is lighter than Jetta, but 33 was too high for me)

I'm keeping my replacement Dunlop SP2 A60s at about 27-28 psi....so far no problems, I've got about another 16k miles on these replacements so far and wear looks normal. --

--------- Tom Flynn '78 Scirocco (sold 1988) '86 GTI (sold 2000) '00 Golf (32k miles so far, to be sold 2018) I speak only for myself

Reply to
Tom Flynn

Are you sure? Do they actually work?

Also, at CAD $28,500 a Golf TDi isn't exactly cheap.

Certainly not when the car is brand new. It would have been filled by some grease monkey at the factory.

Well, if your argument is that spares should always be overinflated in order to minimize their eventual underinflation, I would say that YOU are penalizing the intelligent in order to help the stupid. I would further suggest that if one is going to do this routinely (as Volkswagen seems to have done) one should at least put a warning on the tire, and perhaps put some sort of gauge on the tire valve stem.

Well, I suppose I must be a particularly educated person, since I often have two, or even three, tire gauges in my vehicle. I need more than one because they've become so unreliable. I also generally carry a power inflator as well, because the crappy gauges that are sold everywhere (including VW dealerships) also cause one to lose significant amounts of pressure while trying to get a reading.

Of course, the portable compressors (most of which have even more laughably inaccurate gauges built in) are mostly garbage too. In fact, I burned out two just in the past two weeks, both while topping up the baby tires on my motorcyle trailer, which require 65 psi. The first was not that surprising, having cost "only" $20. It was the first time I'd ever used it - a big mistake, since the warranty had long run out.

I went out and bought two very fancy Michelin digital compressors to replace it and an even older but still functional compressor. They cost $70 each, and claimed to fill a tire to a pre-set pressure. These I tried out on the same day I bought them - and on the same trailer tires that had finished the previous one.

I read the manual thoroughly, and timed the first fill with a stopwatch. The instructions said to allow the compressor to cool for

10 minutes after 10 minutes of use. I never got that far. The motor started smoking after only seven minutes, with the digital gauge still reading only 56 psi. I checked the pressure with one of my more reliable dial gauges, which reads only to 65 psi, and it was off scale.

I then tried the second Michelin machine, and quickly discovered that the digital gauge was the culprit. It would read 15 psi or more lower than the actual pressure and then cause the compressor to kill itself trying to reach an unattainable level.

IMO, if car manufacturers were serious about safe tire inflation, they'd provide every new car buyer with a reliable tire pressure gauge. Buying in bulk, they could probably get a decent digital one made to their own specs for under $30.

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

...

Bummer - The Continentals that came with our 2002 Golf have got 40,000 km on them and look as though they're good for at least another

20,000. If your experience with Goodyears holds for the Eagles we got with the 2004, we'll have to get new tires next spring.

Maybe we should keep the Continentals and sell the Goodyears with the

2002.... ....

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

The onboard Hummer system works.

When you buy compressors for $20 or $70 then your idea that $28,500 is not pocket change compared to a $100,000 vehicle explains that.

I am using tire guages I bought 20 years ago. If you have bad ones the correct place for them is the trash can. The correct place for good ones is in the car and maybe in the toolbox. An ignorant person would save something that does not work and continually complain about it.

I bought an air compressor 15 years ago. Used it for days in a row doing carpentry. Still works. Buy a good compressor and it will treat you well. Toy compressors don't last. I have tire pumps that are 20 years old and work fine. They are pretty darn slow on the tractor tires but they work fine for the wheelbarrows and bucycles that only pump up to 110 psi. Get the right tool for the job and you might be happy. You bought two compressors for $140. Sears has a bunch of compressors listed at $150 and up that would probably up to the task at hand.

I have used the same old Milton pencil type guages my father used back in the 60's. Accurate and reliable. Nothing to really wear out. No battery to fail. Buy one for under $10 and use it. Why can my father use the same guage for 40 years and it still works well while you have a bunch of bad ones? He is pretty fussy about tire pressure.

You cannot expect car manufactures to make c>>

Jim B.

Reply to
jimbehning

Use a bicycle floor pump. These work well enough to add a few psi to a car tire, although you'll still want a car tire pressure gauge (the gauges on bicycle floor pumps tend to give ranges more useful for 100psi bicycle tires, so they may not have markings useful for

30-51psi car tires).

The pen ones cost a lot less than that, and are not difficult to use.

Reply to
Timothy J. Lee

I don't know about today, but when I took delivery of my most recent Jetta in August 2002 about 1/2 of the cars on the lot had Michelin MXV4s and the others had Goodyears. That was true on both of the earlier A4 Jettas I had too. Each time I told the dealer I wanted Michelin tires on my car and each time it was "no problem".

Reply to
Al Rudderham

...

That seems to be the case on my dealer's lot too.

Not much chance of that at my dealership. I couldn't even get them to check the transaxle gear oil level during their $700 PDI. Had to squeeze under the Golf myself to check and top up the fluid (at 480 km it was down by a third of a litre).

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

Your logic is defective. I'm not a multi-millionaire, and I doubt most people here are. $28,000 is not "pocket change" to most people reading this NG, no matter what a Hummer costs. By your silly-ass logic $80,000 for a Hummer would also be "pocket change" if one chose to compare it to say, the cost of a Lear Jet.

Furthermore, if $70 or even $20 compressors were certain to be defective, as you suggest, then the manufacturers and retailers would have to be considered criminals, and should be prosecuted for fraud. Blaming the consumer for buying such products from a reputable retailer is absurd.

If you read my post carefully you would know that I haven't been able to find accurate ones that fit my needs. I make do with the best I've been able to find.

...

I have a compressor I bought five or six years ago for about $30. I've used it a lot, and for stretches considerably longer than 10 minutes.

Again, your logic is defective. You seem to believe that paying more assures one of a better product. I paid twice as much for the Michelin compressors as for the one that works. They turned out to be as useless as the $20 compressor that failed on first try, only more dangerous (since they actually overinflated the tire). By your logic, they should work better. Why would paying four times as much do the trick?

I might consider an all-metal pencil gauge, but haven't run across one in years. If you think the plastic ones can't fail, you're an idiot.

As for accuracy - even the all metal ones are not very accurate, unless you take very good care of them and use them very carefully. Even then, they're difficult to read.

But all of this is totally beside the point. I need a gauge that's quick and easy to use, accurate and reliable, because I'm not the only one who needs to use it.

That means a digital gauge that holds the reading, and preferably allows monitored bleeding of the tire.

If you own a Volkswagen, you must never have read the manual. Mine is full of attempts (or at least lip-service) to making "the consumers be wise people".

It would sure save anyone wanting to check their tire pressure from having to go out and find a reliable gauge. What's the sense of supplying the new car buyer with an over-inflated spare tire without the gauge needed to set it to the proper pressure for use?

I've never bought any tool that was advertised or labeled as "toy". What exactly is your definition? Why are your $10 pencil gauges not "toys" while my digital gauge, which VW sells for $35 in Canada, is? Why isn't a Volkswagen a "toy" too, given that Audis and Porsches cost twice as much?

Achim

axethetax

Reply to
Achim Nolcken Lohse

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